If it were all about safety or security or logistics, we would understand why Major League Baseball is taking such a seemingly passive path to a new season. But as the NBA has given us a July 31 return, and the NFL maintains a green light to go in September, we wonder why our pastime is struggling to push itself off the ground.
As far as we can tell, this discord between baseball owners and baseball players is largely about one thing — money — and thus this squabble between millionaires and billionaires highlights the difference between those who fly in LearJets around the world and we who live in it.
We could even forgive Blake Snell's spastic rant about his money, and forgive Bryce Harper and Nolan Arenado for applauding it. In the big business of pro sports, there are always a few athletes who struggle to see the world beyond their bank accounts. But as far as we can tell, the real problems are not related to COVID-19 (remember the coronavirus?) or the protests that have spilled into our cities and suburbs.
And even worse, it's not about you, the fan, the one who makes all the opulence possible. You are the one who buys the tickets, the jerseys, caps and the overpriced tchotchkes at the ballparks. You watch the games on TV and download the apps onto your tablets and smartphones. You're the ones who hoarded baseball cards as kids and fell in love with baseball so much that, as adults, you now foot the baseball bill.
So as MLB and the MLPBA fight over their slice of the monetary pie, they are not mentioning the people who fund their Robin Leach lives - you. Before MTV peeked into the cribs of the financially rich and culturally famous, Mr. Leach hosted a show called, "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous." It gave us a peek into the outsized contours of the celebrity — the fireplaces and bearskin rugs and bowling alleys and marble staircases curling up to the sky.
While we do have a tabloid fascination with the famous and pseudo-fabulous, we want our sports on time and on point. And baseball was always the blue-collar game. Players lived in the same neighborhoods as their fans, they didn't bulge out of their uniforms, and they definitely didn't have to worry about being social media essential. The Hall of Fame allows for muscular sluggers like Frank Thomas and the postman physique of Greg Maddux.
But now there's a chasm between the people who love baseball and the people who play it. The two used to be the same. Ernie Banks used to yell "Let's play two!" out of his sheer joy for the game. Now players would call their agents first to make sure they get equal pay for both games. And the owners live so far above us we don't know what most of them look like.
MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said the chances of playing baseball in 2020 were "100 percent." He had better be right. Baseball should know, more than any sport, that PR, perception and optics matter. They don't want to be the only sport left out of this summer party. Baseball should lead the return back from the dim days of the coronavirus, not limp in as the last in line.
Twitter: @JasonKeidel
